Rare right whales draw crowds to the bluff at Manomet Point in Plymouth

Like front row seats at a rock concert, the bluff at Manomet Point was jammed Monday afternoon with people peeling their eyes or grabbing hold of binoculars for a rare sighting – endangered right whales feeding just offshore.

Like front row seats at a rock concert, the bluff at Manomet Point was jammed Monday afternoon with people peeling their eyes or grabbing hold of binoculars for a rare sighting – endangered right whales feeding just offshore.

Every couple minutes someone in the crowd along the wood railing would gasp and point, “There he is, there he is.”

Some 200 or 300 yards off, a spout of white water shot up or a black tail lifted into the sky as one of the whales breached the water.

Page 2 of 2 - “We’re concerned about entanglements in fishing gear and right whales getting struck by vessels. These are the shipping lanes from Boston to the Cape Cod Canal,” she said. “Cape Cod Bay is a critical habitat.”

Pepe said conservationists have been working with local harbormasters to warn fisherman and boaters to move slowly and carefully through the area.

For vessels over 65 feet in length, there’s already a restriction to navigate this part of the bay at ten knots or less.

Right whales once numbered around 10,000 before they were hunted to near extinction in the 19th Century, said Pepe.

Of the right whales alive now, less than 100 are reproductive females, added Pepe.

Scientists aren’t sure how much longer these right whales will stay in this western section of Cape Cod Bay before heading north to the Bay of Fundy.